The Horror was a mangled and broken thing.

While it had still been intact, it had been an amalgamation of beasts. It had two legs that were wiry and thin, with only muscle and bone, nothing else under the skin. They were aided by a tail that had to be twice as long as the rest of the Horror, covered in sickly green scales. They varied from the size of dinner plates to thimbles with no discernable pattern, just shoved wherever they would fit on the tail. Jagged barbs stuck up anywhere there was a gap in the scales, leaking a disgusting mixture of puss and venom.

It had two arms, each with seven fingers. Mangy gray fur covered all of the limbs, stained and matted with blood from the massacre it had begun. Each arm had three joints. One at the wrist, one halfway down like on the arm of a Hated, and the last between those two. The claws at the end of the hand extended farther than the fingers themselves, wickedly sharp. They were twisted and barbed, meant to cause as much damage as possible as opposed to a clean cut.

Its torso was not much. Malnourished skin was pulled tight against jutting ribs, no fur or scales to cover the deformities. It was not much besides skin over bone, with only slight bulges to suggest the existence of organs.

Its head was the most disturbing piece of the Monster. A permanently open mouth was situated in the exact center of its face, full of teeth that looked like smaller versions of its claws. Yellow spittle dripped from it in a revolting manner. Eyes covered every other available surface, some as large as an apple and some as small as pebbles. There must have been at least a hundred of them all wrapped around the Horror's head, all darting and squinting as they searched for their next victim.

But that was while it was intact. Now?

It was a torso and head, with a third of the tail sticking out uselessly. Everything else had been reduced to paste and powder by the combination of attacks, the Spirit's spells, and the final explosion. Pits were torn in its body, leaking blood and intestines as the thing died. Almost all of its eyes had been melted to jelly, only a few left, which were all locked on Meda. The magic it had used to combat the Spirit flickered weakly, barely being brought to bear before it was gone again.

It was vulnerable. It had Meda's evolution Goal sitting on its head. Killing something like this would almost certainly fulfill a hidden Goal.

The Elemental rolled forward.

The Horror struggled on the ground as it did, strong even in its broken form. It managed to roll onto its back, knocking the bird's nest off in the process. Its remaining amount of tail jabbed into the ground, and its remaining muscles strained as it pulled itself up. It was barely more than a torso and head sticking out of the ground, with no limbs to speak of. It looked weak.

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The tail twisted, the body fell forward, and a third of Meda's body was gone.

The Monster had used itself like a hammer, slamming down with such force that the Elemental would certainly be dead if its Core had been hit. The Horror was not as venerable as it seemed. But Meda was determined, and even that hit had only resulted in pain, not PAIN. So, with more of both caution and haste, it rolled forward again. It was hard to do when a massive portion of its slime was gone and more was leaking, but the Horror was still getting back up.

It got about halfway to the spot where the tail impaled the ground before the Horror hit it again. The body landed right in the center of Meda's body, where the Core would have been on any normal Elemental. Thankfully, that was something Meda was not. Shattered Form pulled its weight, shifting its Core off-center and changing the shape to that of a large spike. Even as more of the Elemental's body was destroyed, that spike lanced deep into a gash in the Horror's neck.

A choked gurgle sounded through the clearing as Meda inflicted its first harm in this new world. The crystal broke through the diseased skin on the other side of its target and was now carving a tunnel through the Horror's neck. The Horror rose back up and slammed down again, trying to dislodge the suddenly threatening Monster. But the force only made Meda's Core dig deeper into the flesh, only stopped as it hit the other creature's spine.

Shattered Form took hold again as a fraction of the crystal wrapped around the bone, anchoring the Elemental to its foe. The rest slithered up the Horror's neck like a snake, a pointed tip positioned to pierce through the skull into its brain. The Horror slammed backward, and the Core had to rapidly shift in order to avoid being crushed. The Horror had hit its rhythm now, slamming back and forth far faster than it had when the battle began.

As the frantic Monster slammed itself into the ground, more and more of Meda's body was lost. Soon, all that was left was the thin film over its Core. Even if the Elemental could find a way to run, there was no possible way it could survive with so little. It would win this fight and evolve, or die. Whether that be to the Horror or any other Monster.

But it had not been idle. The crystal snake that was its Core had slowly readied itself again and shot forward. Hairline cracks spread in the Horror's skull as the flesh parted. The slamming reached a crescendo, but could still not dislodge the Core. Another hit and a few chips of bone flew away. Another hit and a loud crack sounded through the clearing. One last hit and the crystal met a rotting and corrupt brain.

The slamming stopped. The Horror slumped. A crystal snake slithered across the clearing to a small pile of twigs and grass. A small bird met its end and was consumed by a small layer of gray slime. A sound rang through the air once again.

*DING

Creatures consumed: 1/1